


Endure

by spirrum



Series: Equilibrium [1]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, spoilers for the Trespasser dlc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-13
Updated: 2015-09-13
Packaged: 2018-04-20 13:36:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4789196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spirrum/pseuds/spirrum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A request. A goodbye. </p><p>"Dread Wolf take me."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Endure

**Author's Note:**

> Trespasser destroyed me. This is where I live now.

He’s pulling away, and it’s the last thing she’d planned on saying, but she’s had so much shit thrown her way – has had to endure so bloody much, and she’s so tired, so unbelievably _tired and done_ , that the words pull from her lips without thought or hesitation.

“Take me.”

He stops, and before he can draw back completely, she presses onwards. “You said you wouldn’t lay me with under false pretences.” Bold words. Bolder than he’d think her capable, perhaps, but he has not seen what the world has made her. “But I know now. And I’m  _asking_.”

Short years ago she would have been mortified at saying such a thing. Now she merely questions the wisdom of the offer, but the slight widening of his eyes – that rare flicker of surprise, a sign that he’s not so far gone that he’s beyond her catching him off guard – roots her decision with surety in her heart.

But he recovers quickly, the surprise replaced with grief. “Vhenan–”

“If this is the last time I see you,” she continues, and her voice is not her own now. It’s not the Inquisitor’s voice, this rough,  _pathetic_  croak, holding the tears she refuses to let fall. “Then let me say goodbye.”

Her hands are shaking. The anchor burns, but she ignores it.  _Not now._ Later, when she’s alone, when he is truly gone, let her deal with her body’s betrayal then. Let her have this moment now, if it’s to be their last. Hers has been long years spent wondering what she’d done wrong – what had made him pull away from her touch. War and chaos had reigned, but Skyhold had seen happiness bloom, and persist despite the cold winter grip of the mountains. But not her own, and she’d thought the fault had been hers.

Anger surges in her chest now, when she knows his reason was  _this._

“I would have had no regrets,” she says then, when he hasn’t spoken. “Know that, Solas. I would have regretted  _nothing_ , if you had taken everything.”  _And you did,_  is what she doesn’t say, because she knows he doesn’t see it that way. “And that is why I’m asking now,” she continues, drawing her breath, along with her conviction.

“ _Dread Wolf take me_.”

There is a pause, and she’s certain he’s going to refuse – certain that she’s asking too much; that he’s so set on his path he’s unwilling to so much as look back, to allow himself the selfish indulgence she would so readily, so  _greedily_  take for herself.

She means to look away then, to duck her head, because she’s known his rejection once and she will know it again, and she can’t bear to look at him now. Not after this, after she’s offered herself  _again_ –

Fingers curl under her jaw, and when he kisses her now there’s nothing apologetic about it. There is grief, hard like the press of his mouth, and desperate like the way her hands grapple for the catches of his armour, to pull him closer. And she doesn’t question what he gives or why; doesn’t dare, for fear that he’ll change his mind.

The position is awkward, but she feels relief when he moves to push her back, knee sliding between her legs, and to hold his weight. Her hair snags beneath his arm, and the mark burns, making her fingers stiff and clumsy where they claw to reach his skin. His armour is unfamiliar, so unlike the soft wool tunic she’d imagined peeling off, when their days had been better, brighter,  _simpler_. His days had never been simple, she knows that now, but still she remembers how he was, his gentle smiles and soft laughter, words of wisdom when she sought them and hand bumping hers in passing even as he carried his solemn burden.

It’s not like she’d imagined it would be, back then. Somewhere quiet under the stars. Her empty bed. His smile against her skin. Solas is not smiling now, and neither is she. Instead her tears are hot against her throat, falling now with her consent, and she’s not being wooed with clever words but hands, at once trembling and reverent, hard and unforgiving. There’s no elegance in the way she’s pressed, flat on her back with her breeches bunched around her ankles. No elegance in the way her hands tear at the fabric of his own, fingers shaking, the anchor burning, and drawing a cry from her lips even as he smothers it. Fingers gripping her wrist to hold it above her head, the pain soothes, a momentary relief that makes her sag beneath him.

A pause, then, though his hand doesn’t release its grip on her wrist. A wordless opportunity to push him away, but instead she pulls, her free hand curved around the back of his neck, her silent answer. The grief still sits, a heavy weight on her chest, but there’s reprieve in the warmth of his skin beneath her fingers, pushing past the loosened pieces of his armour to reach the part of him she knows. The living, breathing part that still exists, that is still  _hers_ , if only for this moment. He’s not so far beyond the want of mortal pleasures that the curl of her fingers around him doesn’t succeed in dragging a groan from somewhere deep, to fall against her ear. And he’s not so far down the path of Death that when he takes her, it’s without feeling.

Releasing her wrist, it’s to push her legs further apart, and when he enters her she arches back; draws him deep until there’s no more space. Until two years of distance ceases to exist, and she can breathe without hurting. And there’s relief, building like sob in her chest, to push up her throat. It’s as near as she’s ever had him, nearer than she’d thought she would ever get,  _and yet it’s not enough._ They should have had the chance to learn to know each other; to find their pace, and to try and err. But she’d asked for this knowing it would be all, and she takes it now; takes him with the whole of her, until she can’t pull him any closer. There’s a rock digging into her shoulder and the anchor burns and  _burns_ , but all she knows is his steady weight against her, and though the thrusts feel like they could never be hard enough, never be fast enough, she feels alive like she hasn’t felt in years. 

She knows it before he comes; feels it in the fingers digging into her hipbone, before he jerks against her. And it’s the least composed she’s ever seen him, nose buried in the hollow of her throat as he shudders, no calm words now but a guttural, meaningless sound, lost against her hair. And it’s how she will remember him, she decides, as she takes the whole weight of him, and his release within her. When she can conjure nothing else but his calm acceptance of his fate and hers, she will remember _this_.

He doesn’t leave her until she’s dressed, but it’s not with shame that she fastens her armour; pulls on her coat. Her tears have dried, but the mark of him lingers, an ache between her legs.

“Do you still not regret?”

“Tel’abelas,” she repeats simply. “I just wish you could see why.”

And she’s never known a desire quite so terribly as that, to make him  _see_ , when he turns to walk away.

“I will never forget you.”

She doesn’t rise to leave at once. The anchor burns, and she knows what must be done. Her path lies ahead, different from the one he walks. It takes all her strength not to follow.

But it does not take much of her heart, to decide that she’s not giving up. 


End file.
